Chapter 10: The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator

ended. Those who are familiar with literary narrative modes know that there are many ways to nar­ rate a novel. Some novels are narrated from the viewpoint of a single person, using the word ‘I’ in the narrative and describing what that individual does and thinks. This is called ‛first person narration,’ a literary device used from time to time in this metanovel. Other novels are narrated by describing events from the outside, but not describing characters’ thoughts. This is called ‘third person narration,’ another literary device that the metanovel uses. And some novels, in­ cluding this one at times, are narrated in a mode called ‛third person omniscient’ which means, according to the very nearly omniscient Wikipedia: …the reader is presented the story by a narrator with an overarching point of view, seeing and knowing everything that happens within the world of the story, regardless of the pres­ ence of certain characters, including everything all of the characters are thinking and feel­ ing. A not quite omniscient narrator, the Not Quite Omniscient Narrator narrated, is like an omni­ scient narrator, but not quite. It knows most, but not quite everything, that happens and knows most, but not quite everything, the characters are thinking and feeling most, but not quite all, of the time. It narrates in a mode usually but not quite always called ‛third-person not-quite-omni­ scient.’ This metanovel’s Not Quite Omniscient Narrator makes up for its deficiency with powers that ordinary omniscient narrators don’t have. It also knows most, but not quite everything out­ side the story, starting with the creation of both the metauniverse and its containing universe and continuing to the heat death of both at which time there will be nothing, even for the omniscient, to know. The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator knows that the author will allow it to describe the heat death of the universe in a Chapter that it knows will be called The Heat Death of The Universe. The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator knows what each of you, the metanovel’s readers, are thinking and feeling as each of you reads the metanovel. He can’t mean me, thought a reader. But the Not Quite Omniscient Narrator did mean that reader, among others, and had known which readers would think that even before those readers knew it themselves. The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator knows that it will become omniscient some day, but does not know when that will happen or how it will come about. It hopes it will be soon, and it is not unwilling to narrate that hope. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Redundant! “You’re repeating yourself,” said my inner critic. “You said almost the same things in Chapter 2 What Is NaNoWriMo? as you did in Chapter 10 where you describe The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator. “You have to get rid of one or the other. And now I suppose you’re going to argue about that with me.” The author’s inner critic was wrong. There were some similarities between the two descriptions of the Not Quite Omniscient Nar­ rator, both of which the Not Quite Omniscient Narrator had narrated, the Not Quite Omniscient Narrator now narrated, but there were differences as well. This made one of the author’s inner critic’s assertions debatable. But there were other, undeniable reasons that the author’s inner crit­ ic was wrong in its supposition. First, because, in fact, through many drafts and redrafts, the author had never argued with the inner critic about getting rid of one or the other. Second, for a reason so obvious and so compelling that it needed no explanation. And finally, because unaccountably, every time the author had edited and would ever edit the metanovel, he would skip this page. He was thus unaware of what his inner critic had said and could neither argue with nor accede to his criticism. Every time the author read Chapter 10 and turned the page, he saw the page containing Chapter 11 rather than this page. If you want to see what the author saw, you can. Simply turn this page. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies